Better Beds

Reporter: Helen WellingsBroadcast: Monday 28th June 2010

Story Details

Two terrific new inventions have the power to revolutionize the lives of millions of people. Our stories on certain mattresses that are hot as Hades caused a massive reaction -- Australians around the nation are desperate for a solution and are still contacting Today Tonight about sleepless nights, sweltering in their beds.

Complaints like that drove bed expert, Nick Ristevski, to invent the cool bed.

“It cools the actual body, by several degrees” says Nick.

Dubbed the pest of the 21st century, bed bugs are in plague proportions worldwide. Finding a solution has reached desperation point. “It's huge. We've got 400 times more bed bugs now than we did just a few years ago” says Barbara Biggs, an author and inventor of a BB Safe Ring which starves out bedbugs.

“20,000 would be conservative. This is just what we can see in a quick 5 minute inspection”, said Greg Mills from Allpest.

Greg says the only way to combat bedbug infestations is drastic action - strong chemicals and disposing of all furniture and contents. “A year ago we did no jobs, now we're doing hundreds, in a world economic crisis, the bed bug industry is booming, absolutely booming” says Greg.

“We want to stop the problem by stopping people getting bitten before it becomes a problem” says Barbara.

“Bedbugs feed on blood and they need a blood meal to move from each of their 5 stages of development and you, the person on the bed are the host and they sense you from a meter… so the bed bugs are in the room and they need to climb the leg of the bed to get to you” explains Barbara.

But the rings, installed on all legs and behind the bed head, stop them crawling up onto the bed or couch and eventually they die.

“You just unscrew the leg put the teflon disc, the BB Safe Ring on, screw it in and it is as simple as that” explains Barbara.

He says the company's begun fitting them to beds for hotels and motels.

The BB Safe Ring's been tested by renowned entomologist, known as Professor Bed Bug, Dr Steven Doggett, of Westmead Hospital - he proved the bugs cannot get past the discs.

Certain pillow-top, memory foam and dense latex mattresses can be uncomfortably hot. Mattress specialist, Sandra Hall, of Beds R Us says, ““Some people feel hot in pillow-top mattresses because they are loaded with layers of comfort and instead of sleeping on top of the mattress like they have been in their older style beds, now they're sinking down into the comfort layers and it cuts off the airflow”.

The solution - a little fan in the bed base with a specially designed mattress, invented by Nick Ristevski, owner of Rockdale Mattress company in Sydney. “The air that is injected with the fan in the bed goes through the holes, these holes they go right through the mattress and that goes next to the body and cools the actual body and that is why it's cooler to sleep in this bed” says Nick.

Though still being refined, a cool bed's already been bought by Robert Nelson to replace his hot mattress - around $3,900 for the base/mattress system.

“It was very hard to sleep at night tossing and turning and my wife wouldn't come near me because she said I was like a furnace. This is a great invention, it's really given me a good night's sleep” says Robert.